Tumblr lead developer leaves to work on his own company

Tumblr chief technology officer Marco Arment said he has left the company to work on his own startup, Instapaper. His comments came in an e-mail to VentureBeat today.

While he has left Tumblr as an official executive, Arment (pictured left) said on his blog that he will still be involved with the company as a consultant. Arment served as Tumblr’s lead developer for four years.

“Tumblr’s technical management needs have evolved to require types of experience that I don’t have,” he wrote in a blog post earlier today.

Arment’s departure comes at a time as Tumblr has taken a definitive lead over competing lite-blogging service Posterous in terms of usage and traffic. He said he is not seeking outside investment for Instapaper, a browser-based application that lets users save web pages to “read later.” He also said he will work on other personal projects as he finds time for them.